# How Many Balloons?

> A playful balloon-lift thought experiment. List a few things you would like to float, add your own weight for any
> you have weighed, and see how many party balloons it would take - low, likely and high - drawn as a balloon
> cluster. One metered run estimates every unweighed thing as a low, likely and high weight anchored on base rates.
> People and animals are never counted. A thought experiment, never a ride.

URL: https://how-many-balloons.skillsafe.ai/

## What it does

- Free in the browser: parses a list (one thing per line: name | your weight | note), reads weights in g, kg, oz or
  lb, keeps words that look like people or animals on the ground, and counts balloons for four balloon kinds
  (11-inch latex, 16-inch latex, 36-inch giant latex, 18-inch foil). Lift per balloon is an estimate (helium lifts
  roughly 1 g per litre at room conditions, minus the balloon's skin and ribbon). Ranges are honest at both ends:
  the light case over the strongest balloon, the heavy case over the weakest.
- Pictures: a hex-packed balloon cluster tied to a wicker basket (one drawn balloon stands for 1, 2, 5, 10... when
  the count is large), each thing's weight as a whisker on a log scale, and a table for every balloon kind.
- Metered (one task, `weigh`, on gpt-terra): a low, likely and high weight in grams for every unweighed thing with
  the base rate behind it, your own weights kept exactly, the one thing worth weighing first, a verdict and a short
  flight note. The page re-checks every reply.
- Verdict rule, checked in order: grounded (everything on the list is alive), bouquet (likely total 100 g or less),
  armful (2 kg or less), cloud (above 2 kg).
- After a weigh-in: type your own weight for the thing it says to weigh first and the page recounts the total,
  the verdict and the balloons for free, then points at the next widest range.
- Share the answer: a few lines (the count, the safety line and the link) for the chat where someone asked.
- Exports: Markdown, CSV, JSON. Saved lists go to the person's account (a `flights` collection) when they press save.

## Why

A famous 1982 backyard flight in a lawn chair lifted by helium weather balloons still makes people wonder how many
balloons it takes to lift something. This app is the safe version of that curiosity: float your things on paper.

## Safety

Never tie balloons to anyone alive, and never let balloons go outdoors. The model never writes a balloon count; the
page does the arithmetic.

## Developer surface

- API tutorial: https://how-many-balloons.skillsafe.ai/api.html
- Input fields: task (always "weigh"), things (a JSON-encoded array of {id, name, weight_g, note}), page_facts.

## Source

Built on the SkillSafe skill @tjboudreaux/thinking-probabilistic (estimating with base rates and ranges, then naming
what would update the estimate): https://skillsafe.ai/skill/@tjboudreaux/thinking-probabilistic